My name is Joshua Jenkins and this is debris; a collection of tiny snapshots into my life. I make websites in Portland. I like bicycles, coffee, cities, running, beer, and letters. I like other stuff too.

If you're feeling sassy you can ask me a question.

 

  1. This is what I do for a living.

    This is what I do for a living.


  2. I finally put up my portfolio / personal website. I’ve had a blank server page for probably close to a year. Poor form, self.

    Check it out.


  3. So I get paid to make internets. This is my latest internet. It also just so happens that I work at this internet (in real life).

    So I get paid to make internets. This is my latest internet. It also just so happens that I work at this internet (in real life).


  4. The invite-only web is starting to irritate me. I love exclusive communities and I love new technology, but I do not like waiting to get in somewhere only to finally get in and realize no one else I care about is in there so the entire social aspect is busted. Case in point: Google Wave.


  5. Google has just released Google Chrome Frame, a plugin that tells Internet Explorer to render the page with WebKit instead of ShitFactory or whatever Microsoft uses internally. That means predictable layout quirks, some HTML5 support, and less alcohol while coding.

    Now to figure out how to get apathetic users to install the plugin.

    LINKGoogle Chrome Frame →


  6. That didn’t last long.

    That didn’t last long.


  7. Video placeholder for a site I’m working on. (verus is Latin for versus).

    Video placeholder for a site I’m working on. (verus is Latin for versus).


  8. As great as Google Chrome is, it’s really disappointing that it’s the only modern browser (Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer, and Opera) to not support some form of web-font embedding. They claim it’s a security issue, which I don’t doubt, but it needs to be remedied quickly as it is a huge detraction from a lot of websites. It also stops me from using Chrome as my main browser (well that and the fact that it’s still buggy and missing features on OS X despite being version 4.x and lacking stability I would expect from a 1.x release, or earlier). I can’t decide if this is a small gripe or not, it may not matter to a lot of people, but as web designer it’s a crucial piece and I’m crossing my fingers that it’s addressed soon.

    As great as Google Chrome is, it’s really disappointing that it’s the only modern browser (Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer, and Opera) to not support some form of web-font embedding. They claim it’s a security issue, which I don’t doubt, but it needs to be remedied quickly as it is a huge detraction from a lot of websites. It also stops me from using Chrome as my main browser (well that and the fact that it’s still buggy and missing features on OS X despite being version 4.x and lacking stability I would expect from a 1.x release, or earlier).

    I can’t decide if this is a small gripe or not, it may not matter to a lot of people, but as web designer it’s a crucial piece and I’m crossing my fingers that it’s addressed soon.


  9. I’ve been reading up a bit about HTML 5 lately and I am going to start outlining some things I find to be generally neato. The first is native support for “placeholder text” in form inputs.

    Placeholder text is pretty much everywhere anymore, the common example is search boxes that have, generally, lower-contrast text already in the search box that says something to the effect of “search [service]” in lieu of using a form label or some bastard table based form and terrible markup. Focusing on the element clears out the text and what you type in replaces it.

    It’s a useful, and pretty much standard, UI experience at this point, but it requires Javascript to get it done today. It’s not a lot of markup, especially with mature Javascript libraries like jQuery, but it’s a small hassle every time you want to do it.

    HTML5 proposes adding a new attribute to input elements called placeholder which takes care of this for you without any additional markup. In the future we’ll be able to to do something like <input type=”text” placeholder=”Search Entries”> and move on with our lives.

    Currently support looks like it’s still a ways off for most browsers, unfortunately. You can read more about placeholder in the current HTML5 draft.